1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a pallet management system for efficiently using a reusable (hereinafter referred to as “returnable”) pallet while utilizing a radio tag in transportation across a wide distribution region, and also to a pallet, a radio tag, and a management method and program all necessary for the pallet management system.
2. Description of the Related Art
In commodity transportation involving a plurality of commodity distribution terminals, pallets are often used as these are easy to manage and transport. In conjunction with such pallets, radio tags (referred also as RFID: Radio Frequency Identification) are also widely used, and a number of systems for efficiently managing the demand and supply of pallets in commodity transportation while using a radio tag have been proposed.
Meanwhile, there has been a growing demand for use of returnable, reusable pallets in consideration of environmental issues and agreements such as the “Carbon Oxide Emission Regulation”.
Returnable pallets are typical made of wood or plastic. Wooden pallets are less durable than plastic pallets, and present a greater difficulty in providing a space for accommodating a radio tag while retaining sufficient strength. Further, because wooden pallets are subject to wood import regulations similar to plant quarantine, all wooden pallets must be subjected to the appropriate types and methods for processing so as to conform with the regulations, which may differ from country to country. However, wooden pallets are still advantageous to plastic pallets in terms of their lower cost.
While plastic pallets are superior in durability, and also in environmental point of view as waste plastic can be recycled or used as fuel in thermal recycling, plastic pallets cost several times as much as wooden pallets due to molding die costs, even when made from waste plastic stock.
FIG. 2 is a diagram which was referred to in conceiving the present invention. The diagram shows the rates of recycling of pallets within respective commodity distribution ranges, one being the company which is originally entitled to possesses the pallet (hereinafter referred to as the pallet owner), another involving the pallet owner and a company group (corporate group) including associated or group companies, and still another involving the pallet owner, a company group, and a third party such as a customer or another company not associated with either its own company or a company group.
As shown, a high pallet recycling rate results when the pallet distribution range involves only a single company, but the rate drops when the distribution ranges extends to a corporate group or to include a third party.
In general, it is rare for a single company or manufacturing entity to receive a certain quantity of commodities transported using pallets and to ship out different commodities of the same quantity. In overseas commodity distribution, in particular, given the extra transportation cost of returning empty pallets, disposable wooden pallets, which need not to be returned, are preferable in terms of cost. This hinders spread of plastic pallets which are superior in an environmental point of view.
As a solution of this problem, a rental pallet management technique for renting a pallet to a plurality of companies under contract has been disclosed.
When a rental pallet management system is introduced using a plastic pallet in order to promote returnable use of a pallet, a radio tag is attached to each pallet so that transportation of a pallet is managed using a reader for the radio tag, installed in each terminal and a server connected to the reader through a network. With this arrangement, pallet supply and demand can be efficiently managed.
However, in actual business practice, new resources are put into use without limitation as, for example, new pallets are put into use in order to compensate for lost pallets equipped with radio tags or shortage of pallets in international commodity distribution across many companies. Moreover, costs continue to increase as empty pallets are transported without limitation, with insufficient consideration to environmental issues, leading to the disposal of empty pallets.
In general, each radio tag has only a serial number, and other attribute data, while traceable using the serial number, are collectively managed by a server. However, should a pallet be de-routed, either intentionally or accidentally, the pallet falls out of the scope of management.
Consequently, the introduction of rental pallets in international commodity distribution has been limited to a limited number of companies. Moreover, the lag in distribution and adoption of readers has led in a deficiency of effective measures to prevent missing pallets.